South German guitarist SIGGI SCHWARZ is among the most respected rock guitarists in Europe. Born in 1958, he played guitar in various bands and now works as producer / songwriter / arranger and has his own band under his moniker, continuously touring and recording.
Now Swartz is releasing “New Love Songs”, including 14 tracks of original material.
Siggi is mostly known for his 2007 album recorded with Michael Schenker and his last year’s own tribute to Gary Moore. Some well known names have played in his past records such as Steve Lukather, Neil Murray or Chris Thompson to name a few.
However, Siggi is relatively unknown for major audiences, even more outside Europe.
On “New Love Songs”, Swartz, unlike on most of his previous albums where the guitar solos were the focus, has put special emphasis on the vocals and the song-format.
Indeed, the central theme in these songs is ‘love’ but mainly lyrically, this isn’t a ballads album at all. We have a couple, the rest are up/mid tempo tunes ranging from Classic Rock to Melodic Rock peppered with diverse sounds and stylings.
To mention some; “Best Thing” is a melodious rocker with a breezy feeling, “Rhythm Of Life” has a recent Santana commercial approach and “New Love” is filled with nice acoustics and fine harmony vocals.
“Raining in My Heart” is a bluesy number very Gary Moore influenced and “I Cant’t Live Without You” has a cool slide guitar work.
“Love Of My Life” has a melodic rock format with strong electrics in its core, while “The One” resembles more classic sounds of the eighties.
“New Love Songs” is basically oriented to timeless Classic Rock watering in other classy related styles as well.
Siggi Schwartz is a complete and skillful six-string player, owner of an exceptional tone. The soulful voice of singer Ralf Damrath fits perfectly to the character of these compositions, very well accompanied by the rest of Siggi’s tight band.
Perhaps the album is too long for his own sake, but the songs are short and entertaining individually, helped for a good production for this kind of ageless material.
Clearly and album made with a lot of heart and ‘love’ for the classic, good sounds. Only released in Germany.
Good Stuff.
01 – Best Thing
02 – Rhythm Of Life
03 – New Love
04 – Raining in My Heart
05 – I Cant’t Live Without You
06 – Love Of My Life
07 – Love Is A Beautiful Thing
08 – Loving Every Minute
09 – Still In Love With You
10 – Little Dreamer
11 – I Close My Eyes
12 – A River Like You
13 – The One
14 – Sacrifice Of Love